Hydrolysis of aliphatic sulphonyl chlorides



Patented Sept. 24, 1946 F ALIPHATIC SULPHONYL CHLORIDES .nYnRoLYsIs T CE?! Thomas Edward Dillon, New Castle, Del.,- assignor to E; I. du'Pont de, Nemours & Company, Wilmington, DeL, a corporation of Delaware s. a I 1 11 .This'iin'vention' relates to a method tor hydrolyzing organic'sulphonyl chlorides. More-particularly, this invention"deals with a process for preparingaliphatic sulphona'tes by alkaline hy-. drolysis of aliphatic sulp'honyl chlorides.

eeming. Application October 30, 1945,

' Serial No. 625,085

5 claims. 01. 260-513) said limiting quantity would normally beem:-

ployed. I have found that the use of such auxiliary quantities of an active organic nitrogenous base .The mentioned aliphatic sulphonyl chlorides are generally prepared by reacting with a gaseous mixture of sulphur dioxide and chlorine or;

alternatively. with sulphuryl chloride and a'catalyst, in the presence of actinic light, upon'saturated aliphatic hydrocarbons having various chain lengths (from "4' to '50'carbon atoms) and being straight ch'ained or branched. Numerous patents ,have issued describing and claiming thesep'rocesses, among which the following may be mentioned 'as typical: Reed, Re. $20,968; Reed, 2,174,492; Fox etal, 2,174,506; Tinker et 2.1., 2,174,507; Fox et al., 2,174,508; Lockwood et;al., 2,193,824; Henke et al., 2334364; and Kharasch, 2,383,319. I

erally .mono-,' dior "poly sulph'onyl' chlorides, oftenihaving one or more chlorine atoms attached directly to carbon atoms in the molecule.

- The hydrolysis of the aforegoin'g compounds to the gcorresponding sulphonates has hitherto mentioned U. S. patents as well as in Reed.

2,174,110 andReed, 2,276,090. 7

"'InTJ'. S. Patent" No. 2,319,121, a proposal has' employ alcohols as hydrolyzing been made to agents.

- The present invention"is concerned primarily with the caustic alkali method of hydrolysis and' it; is 'anobject of this invention to improve said method in a'general way,=wh'ereby to facilitate hydrolysis and to produce better quality products; Other and further importantobjects of "this invent'ion will appear as the description proceeds." "I' have found that severaldistinct improve-.

ments, as more fully discussedbelow, are obtained if the hydrolysis of the above indicated. organic sulphonyl chlorides is efiected by the aid of aqueous alkali inthe'presence of a small quan-.

tity ofzan aCtivebrganic nitrogenous base. By

active? I means that the'base will readily form,

a, saltwith hydrogen chloride. By small quanhas the efiect of lowering the hydrolysis temperature, shortening the timeof hydrolysis, pre-.

venting excessive foaming and decreasing-the viscosity of the reaction mass. All of these i ac tors, together have the further; effect of: increasing the active-ingredient contentotthe' product;

inasmuch ,as 'decomposition or desulphonationlof the product during;the hydrolysis step is held by:

' the above factors at a minimum. The saiddecomposition of the sulphonyl chloride appears to be --The products of'theabbve reaction are gen- V V lected-nitrogenous base. Alternatively, a mixture of "the nitrogenous-base and the aqueous alkali examples are given to illustrate my preferred- Parts mentioned are "byv tity"-l meanany quantity less than that which I would byitseli sufllcetoefiect hydrolysis oi the museum r lp onyl ;.ch. Qiid a thou n. the; were. .ordinarrrracticeless t an. 20% or;

a function of the ;.temperature, and accordingv tov my invention, hydrolysis proceeds suflicient- 1y rapidly at lower temperatures so that. excessive;

decomposition is avoided.

In practice according to my invention, the sulmayvbe fed slowly into the sulphonylation mass. A third option is to enter first the selected nitrogenous baseinto the sulphonylated reaction mass. and then add the aqueousalkali. 1

The temperature of the mass during the hy-: drolysis step may vary. from'room temperature. to l20P C. or higher. But inasmuch as it is de-' sirable to keep decomposition down .to a minimum, it ispreferred in practice to effect hy-' mode of operation.

wei tv I Example 1 'A mixture of 336 parts of S02 and 267 parts of chlorine was passed into 300 parts of molten The product was then hydrolyzed by adding gradually with agitation to a mixture of 262 parts of 50% aqueous sodium hydroxide solution and 7.5 parts of Solvent P (the commercially availlav-hydrolysis in. absence of any amine. The

3 action was also completed in a much shorter time, without foaming diificulty, and the product was obtained in better yield and quality.

Example 2 the product used had a boiling range of 190-210" C.

The product was hydrolyzed by-adding gradually to 294 parts of aqueous NaOH containing 9.6 parts of pyridine while maintaining the temperature in the range-95-105 C. The hydrolysis mass was diluted with alcohol'and filtered, unreacted oil was separated and the con-' centration of the remaining mass was adjusted to of active ingredient. The mass remained thin and smooth during the hydrolysis, with no foaming and a good yield of light colored product'was obtained. Similar results were obtained sodium hydroxide solution containing 4 parts of morpholine, while maintaining the temperature at -85 C. The hydrolysis mass was further diluted with water until the unreacted oil;sepa-.:

rated. The latter was removed and the hydrolyzed product, after addition of sodium sulphate and borax, was evaporated to dryness on a drum dryer. Advantages similar to those described in Example 1 were found in having the amine present.

7 Example 3 -85'C. The masswas dilutedso as to'contain about 22% of active ingredient, the oil was separated andthe aqueous'product was used in this form. The hydrolysis proceeded smoothly in the presence-of the monoethanolamine Example 4 u A mixture of-106 parts of refined parafii n' wax and 19 part of petrolatum was treated with. 88

parts of S02 and 49 parts of C12 :aspreviously described.

The hydrolysis was carried out with: 1 25 parts of 50% aqueous NaOH in the presence of..5:. parts of pip-eridine. The hydrolysis was startedat room temperature and the temperature was allowed to rise to 70 C. during hydrolysis. 'Thehydroly sis' proceeded smoothly without formation or lumps and the product was alight cream colored paste ready for use.

Example 5 A mixture of 285 parts of refined paraffin: wax and 0.97 parts of stearamide was heated to 70 C. and 428 parts of sulphuryl chloride was added over a period of 4 hours while irradiating with actinic light as described in U. S. 2,383,319.

To this mixture was added 15; parts of triethanolamine, then 192 parts of 65% aqueous NaOH was gradually added with agitation "while maintaining the temperature in the: range -95" C. The hydrolysis" proceeded smoothly andrapid- 1y, yielding a smooth cream colored paste.

' Example 6 A mixture of 187: parts of SOz 'and parts of Cll. was passed into320 parts'of alky latio'n' bottoms with. agitation and irradiation.

alkylation bottoms consists ot a mixture ot saturated branched chain hydrocarbons-obtained as". a: byproduct from iso octane' mama-aw by .using'..9.6 parts of trimethylamine in place of .the pyridine.

It will be understood that the details in the above examples may be varied within wide limits, without departing from the spiritof this invention. Thus, the alkaline solution may be heated to 70-80 C. prior to neutralization or may be at room temperature before beginning the addition of sulphonyl chloride.

In place of the nitrogenousbase's named in the examples, many others may be used, toninstance, pyridine, -piperidine,-pic'oline', niono-g 'di or tri-ethanolamine, morpholine, N-methyl morpholine, or diethyl-cyclohexyl amine. Ingeneral, it is believed that any nitrogen base which readily forms a hydrochloride salt will assist inthe neutralization of the aliphatic 'sulphoriyl "chlo rides.

For some uses the small amounts 'of amine left in the product may be objectionable if an amine with an unpleasant odorsuch as the methyl amines, pyridine, etc., is'used as thechydro'lysis catalyst. For such uses it isusually, preferable to employ odorless amines such as ,therethanol. amines. On the other hand, the unpleasant smelling amines may be removed or chemically altered after the hydrolysis, in knownmanner' such as by treatment with ethylene oxide, oxidation; etc. Similarly, aromatic amines may'ibe objectionable where the product is to be us'ediin personal contact.

The concentration of the amine used in catalyzing the hydrolysis may vary from 1% up to 15% or 20% of the theoretical quantity required: for complete neutralization of the'sulphonchlo ride. However, 1-3% onthe weight or the stil phonylation mass" has been found to produce the:

most desired effect at minimum cost.

As for the alkali, potassium hydroxide, calcl-iim hydrox de, or other metallic hydroxidesiwhich react with sulphonyl chlorides maybe used for neutralization in lieu of sodium hydroxide. actual practice, however, sodium :hydroxidei'is prob-ably the only one that would-normally be used. ,The concentration of the "alkali may vary" appreciably, say from. 20% to 65%, as illustrated.

mass as well as-Ios'sin yield. With a'g-iv en degree of agitation and a given temperature "thtfmeof hydrolysis isconsiderably shortened, reducingthe" cost of the product by increasing the capacity of the equipment; alternatively, the same reaction time may be achieved at a lower temperature. The disadvantage of increasing temperature to reduce th reaction time, rather than using the catalyst, is that desulphonylation increases with increasing temperature and this reduces yield and quality of product. Also,- although the hydrolysis i improved by improving the agitation such improvement is often limited by the tendency to foam. When proceeding according to my invention, the tendency to foam is considerably reduced.

I claim as my invention: I

1. In the process of hydrolyzing an aliphatic sulphonyl chloride by reacting "upon the same with aqueous caustic alkali, the improvement which consists in effecting the reaction in the,

' spending sulphonic acid, which comprises react-' 'ing upon said sulphonyl chloride with an aquenitrogenous base .7 which is sufficiently basic to g form a salt with hydrogen chloride.

4. A process of hydrolyzing an aliphatic sulphonyl chloride to produce a salt of the corresponding sulphonic acid, which comprises reacting upon said sulphonyl chloride with aqueous caustic alkali in quantity substantially sufiicient to efiect by itself the desired hydrolysis, said aqueous alkali containing further a quantity of an organic nitrogenous base corresponding in molar proportion to not over 20% of the quantit of the caustic alkali employed.

5. The process of hydrolyzing an aliphatic sulphonyl chloride to produce the corresponding sodium sulphonate, which comprises entering said organic sulphonyl chloride, at a temperature of about 80 to 100 0., into an aqueous solution of sodium hydroxide of to strength and containing a quantity of an organic nitrogenous base corresponding to from 1% to 3% by weight of the organic sulphonyl chloride to be treated.

THOMAS EDWARD DILLON. 

